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Heroin addiction kills 30,000 people per year in Russia – a third of global deaths from the drug – but now there is the added problem of krokodil. He estimates that overall, around 5 per cent of Russian drug users are on krokodil and other home-made drugs

In the city's main drug treatment centre, Artyom Yegorov talks of the devastation that krokodil is causing. "Desomorphine causes the strongest levels of addiction, and is the hardest to cure," says the young doctor, sitting in a treatment room in the scruffy clinic, below a picture of Hugh Laurie as Dr House.

"With heroin withdrawal, the main symptoms last for five to 10 days. After that there is still a big danger of relapse but the physical pain will be gone. With krokodil, the pain can last up to a month, and it's unbearable. They have to be injected with extremely strong tranquilisers just to keep them from passing out from the pain."

While heroin costs from £20 to £60 per dose, desomorphine can be "cooked" from codeine-based headache pills that cost £2 per pack, and other household ingredients available cheaply from the markets.

It is a drug for the poor, and its effects are horrific. It was given its reptilian name because its poisonous ingredients quickly turn the skin scaly (krokodil=crocodile). Worse follows. Oleg and Sasha have not been using for long, but Oleg has rotting sores on the back of his neck.

"If you miss the vein, that's an abscess straight away," says Sasha. Essentially, they are injecting poison directly into their flesh. One of their friends, in a neighbouring apartment block, is further down the line.

"She won't go to hospital, she just keeps injecting. Her flesh is falling off and she can hardly move anymore," says Sasha. Photographs of late-stage krokodil addicts are disturbing in the extreme. Flesh goes grey and peels away to leave bones exposed. People literally rot to death.

It's sad! but with many intravenous drug abusers it's the lack of personal hygiene! Simply because some stop caring all together. To inject the "krokodil" i read you need a huge needle so the puncture wound is large allowing for all kinds of dirt to get in then you ad a weak immune system due to poor diet and drug addiction and BINGO a nasty sore that will grow out of control. Once that dirty bacteria is in the blood stream you can forget about getting better.
Anyone ever googled pics of a liver damaged by alcohol? I think that's just as bad

It's sad! but with many intravenous drug abusers it's the lack of personal hygiene! Simply because some stop caring all together. To inject the "krokodil" i read you need a huge needle so the puncture wound is large allowing for all kinds of dirt to get in then you ad a weak immune system due to poor diet and drug addiction and BINGO a nasty sore that will grow out of control. Once that dirty bacteria is in the blood stream you can forget about getting better.
Anyone ever googled pics of a liver damaged by alcohol? I think that's just as bad

No, it's way worse than what you're saying. I wish it was as simple as dirt.

In this case they are injecting a very poisonous homemade substance (desomorphine) which simply deteriorates their skin and flesh until it peels off. All of this simply because heroin is too expensive for them.

lol. i almost laughed. make sure you watch that youtube video and get back to me

I did watch it... and usually i'm not grossed out by a lot of things, but that shit churned by stomach real good

I must say though, I really do not pity or feel sorry for these people. This is a choice that they made... you shouldn't need warning label to figure out that something might **** you up... you jumped you fell, its very simple... but very nasty at that. I wonder what that smells like....

I've read some articles and a book on meth and other drugs like heroin and it is real scary to read some of the stuff that goes on.

Drugs are I think a way for a lot of big time people who are accepting money and pharmaceutical companiesto get richer and also a way of population control.

We can spend days writing about the who and why and how it all starts, but ultimately, drug use, it is one of the biggest tragedies that a person who can inflict on themselves. Especially poor people who find a *new* way to get a high without knowing the effects of the drug.

Do I feel sympathy? To a certain degree I do, these people were young carefree individuals who have fallen under a dark power they can not get out from.

wow i thought meth was bad...
i'll stick with good ol bud, cheap, effective and worse that can happen is you eat everything in your living room including the tv.

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